he could
help it,--preferring, I suppose, to take the risk of being hanged later
on,--and the moment that he saw what I would be at he sprang off his
perch so hurriedly that he fell headlong to the deck, while our lads
sent up a howl of savage derision.

"Put a charge of grape in on top of your round shot, lads," I ordered,
"and blaze away as fast as you can load. The _Wasp_ has lost her wings,
but her sting remains, and we'll make those scoundrels feel it yet
before we have done with them!"

The men responded to this with a loud, fierce hurrah, and turned to
their guns again as cheerfully as though they were still certain of
victory, although there was probably not a man there who did not by that
time realise that the chances were all against the gallant little
schooner ever reaching port again.

The battle now raged with absolutely maniacal fury, the two schooners
being by this time within biscuit-toss of each other, the pirate
schooner lying on our weather-beam. The guns--so hot that they
threatened to leap over the low rail into the sea--were loaded and fired
as fast as the men could serve them, and, fighting at such close
quarters, the carnage on both sides was frightful, the bulwarks of both
vessels being practically shot away, and the guns and those who served
them left absolutely defenceless. Our deck was like a shambles--there
seemed to be more dead than living upon it--and the scuppers were all
spouting blood, while the pirates were in scarcely better case, although
it was now apparent that they had originally outnumbered us by something
like three to one. How long the matter would have continued in this
fashion it is impossible to say, but after we had thus been fighting
almost hand to hand for about a quarter of an hour, during which the
pirate schooner gradually drew ahead of us, a lucky shot from one of our
guns brought down her mainmast, when she fell broad off, passed across
our bows, raking us severely as she went, and then drove rapidly away to
leeward, her people having apparently at length come to the conclusion
that they had had all that they wanted in the way of fighting.

The moment it became certain that the fight was over I sank down upon
the breech of the nearest gun, mopped the blood and perspiration from my
face, and tried to understand the scene of ruin and carnage that
surrounded me; for, with the cessation of the turmoil and excitement of
battle, everything seemed suddenly to assum